Subject: Radioactive Glassware

From: [email-masked] (Karl Lembke)
Date: Sun, 12 Dec 1993 15:32:00 -0800

JETI>) to make glass wares yellow Uranium (or plutonium) was mixed in
    >> with the glass.
    >>
    >>   1- would this lead to some health problems and possible
    >> radiation poisoning over time,
    >>
    >>   2- Would this affect the taste of food?!
    >>    (You know, things just don't taste the same as when I

JETI>Couple of decades ago one of the major ceramics companies (don't
remember
    >which) sold an orange-glazed dinnerware under their trademark, Fiesta
Ware.
    > This (orange only) glaze was a uranium glaze, and was significantly
    >radioactive.  One of the local radiological monitoring courses from EMA
    >uses pieces of it as a source for the geiger counters, and it really
makes
    >them buzz.

I recall hearing that yellow glazed pottery from Mexico had been
banned from sale in the US because it incorporated uranium in its
glaze.

Since there seems to have been some documented problems with lead
in pottery glazes leaching into acid juices, I would be a little
reluctant to use uranium glazed pottery for food storage.  (Alas,
I don't recall whether uranium is a bone seeker or not.)

Perhaps if the pottery were glazed, then a clear overglaze were
applied....

But, there are other sources of radioactive material that we don't
worry about so much.  I believe the yellow color in dental appliances
may still be from uranium glaze.  Radioactive materials have been
used in eyeglasses.

And brazil nuts, which grow in monazite ores, contain something
like 10^-15 Ci/g of radium daughter products.

The good news is, according to a review article by Luckey, in
(i think) the January 1980 _Health Physics_, some amount of
radiation is actually good for us, and we could all improve
our health by upping our doses a bit.

Go figure.

Maybe over a slice of brazil nut pie served on a yellow ceramic
plate.  :-)

 * SLMR 2.1a * Ye shall know the truth, and it shall make you freak.

 * Origin: Salata BBS * Redondo Beach, CA * (310) 543-0439 Fidonet:
(1:102/125)

---

From: [email-masked] (John Bartmess)
Date: Tue, 14 Dec 1993 13:34:47 GMT

..JETI>) to make glass wares yellow Uranium (or plutonium) was mixed in
..    >> with the glass.
..    >>   1- would this lead to some health problems and possible
..    >> radiation poisoning over time,
..    >>   2- Would this affect the taste of food?!
..    >>    (You know, things just don't taste the same as when I
..JETI>Couple of decades ago one of the major ceramics companies (don't
..remember
..    >which) sold an orange-glazed dinnerware under their trademark, Fiesta
..Ware.
..    > This (orange only) glaze was a uranium glaze, and was significantly
..    >radioactive.  One of the local radiological monitoring courses from 
..MA.    >uses pieces of it as a source for the geiger counters, and it 
..really.makes
..    >them buzz.

I missed the start of this thread....but I work in a building that has
its halls lined with uranium oxide-glazed tiles. The background is half
again "normal" outside background, but still a fraction of what I
would get extra from cosmic rays on a single cross country airplane
flight. No, I wouldn't use Fiesta Ware as my standard dinner plates, but
paranoia attached to all the little things that might "get you" is
unreasonable. My biggest daily risk, by orders of magnitude, is still
driving to and from work. I'll let the FDA, etc., worry about Fiesta 
Ware.
   BTW, plutonium will NOT be in such stuff; it's completely synthetic,
far too valuable to use as a mundane glaze (uranium oxide is actually
quite cheap), and far too toxic - in fact the most toxic substance known.
 
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| Dept. of Chemistry      | time" football, obviously are not those |
| Univ. of Tennessee      | of the University of Tennessee.         |
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